Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Notes on Meetings One and Two

(This is a post I began when listening to the first and second meetings but didn't publish. Dated August 19. The reason for the post was to give verifiable evidence of my listening to the two meetings.)

I define a "meeting" as a gathering of people in temporal and ordinal form. The most encouraging aspect of the two meetings that I have listened to was the adherence to some temporal and ordinal form. It wasn't just a batch of random. The meeting was centered with a leader as a point of reference. Leigh led everyone through introductions. He had an alphabetical list and called off the names which gave cue to each member of the meeting. Whenever a member wished to speak they gave cue to Leigh by raising of hands. I don't know what that is in elluminate, probably some visual smilie that you use to signal the group.

12 participants:

LeighBeeDarylElderBobGregJeffreyMaryNancySarahSeanVidaVioleta

Because there were clear temporal limits (one hour) the meeting moved ordinally through the agenda. What I like about ordinal form is that it allows members an opportunity to fulfill their rights and responsibilities to speak to the group.

At one of the meetings, someone put a picture upon the screen which blocked the agenda that Leigh had made. I found that to be annoying. I would have rather seen the agenda.

Splitting the meeting into two sessions was a great idea but I think that there should be two facilitators, possibly an assistant, while retaining Leigh as the overall course leader. This way people know that the meeting will happen. The attendance of this meeting was slightly lower and I wonder if the missed meeting was a cause?

I wonder why only one session is posted afterward? With each meeting of two sessions, there should be four sessions posted.

I liked listening. It sounded like a verbal summary of what is being blogged. However, I found myself doing a bunch of other tasks and not really paying attention. I was kind of like reading online. I don't really read very well online. It's more like skimming, not attentive reading. It's like that with the blogs. At least I know it, so I just keep going back and reviewing what strikes my fancy. It takes several readings to scratch the surface of some of these blogs.

I also noticed something that ElderBob said about people gathering from different regions and times. Ha! I am blogging alot about organizing around time zones and this jumped out at me. Talk about people only hearing what they want to hear! Well, that's the way I listened to the meeting.

ElderBob also said something like "traditional communities were established on a rail line or waterway, along a common line". I thought that was interesting. people once had physical connection. I ask myself "What common lines exist now?" I think that there are some physical connections

ElderBob also said that "you can be a member of many communities". OK. I can buy that to an extent but I can only absorb so much. Offline, I can become a member of so many communities but not an unlimited number. Likewise we should remind ourselves that communities don't function when there are unlimited numbers of members because an unlimited number is not able to be counted and no rational discussion, deliberation or debate can take place (with the exception of very small groups of about 5 to 7 members). But in any case, a whole number is necessary if we are to calculate any relative quantity such as equality, majority and minority.

Bee: common ground

EB: Not geographical but mindset

Artie says: Yeah but it's mindsets of people who come across eachother at the same time on the Internet. I think that the temporal has superseded the geographical as a limitation. We are not separated by geography, but time. The web is does not overcome the time obstacle. The Internet is no faster than the old candlestick telephone. It's the number of people who have access at once that complicates.

What we need to do is take the old forms that Grandpa and Grandma utilized to bridge the geographical divides between people and apply them to the Time Divide.

EB: I live in one community that developed from a set of physical circumstances

Artie adds: We are facing a common physical limitation with the time issue. It governs us whether we like it or not.

Bee: When people come online they need a place to come to.

Artie says: How about small clubs that are easy to access according to local time? Small clubs of about 10 or 15 people meeting at a local time who are working on a program together.Leigh ended the meeting with the suggestion that we also organize our own little 3 or 4 person meetings. I liked this idea because small groups are easier to schedule and to absorb. I think it would stimulate some good blogging.

The two meetings constitute two separate groups that are naturally divided by time as if it were a geographical limitation. They are united for one purpose as one community, but are not only two distinct meetings, but two distinct groups with distinct memberships. If they did not have two distinct memberships then there was no need for two meetings! (Get it?) They could present the same program at their own pace with full autonomy. Clubs should be as convenient to attend as those Rotary clubs that are distributed geographically. In Rotary, they put a club where people are, but we put a club when people are, in order to give a wide variety of choices as convenient as geographically placed clubs.

Looking at this page for Rotary Club meetings I looked up a few clubs and I found that traditional meeting times are breakfast, lunch and dinner, with dinner probably being the most popular. Most popular local times appear to be 6 or 7 pm, noon and 6 or 7 am. I think that clubs should be timed similarly with some minor tweaks. If you can't tell the local meeting time, then you are probably in the wrong club.

I don't think that times should be GMT unless the community of clubs has a thorough training session in Clocks and Time. At least a complete training session in the World Clock page. This would be covered in a practical dialogue form with no experts (as all practical dialogue is for the purpose of building community expertise within the membership).